IBD Editorials

Why Does DHS Need More Bullets Per Officer Than Army?

04/26/2013 06:35 PM ET

Federal Power: Homeland Security's procurement officer is grilled in Congress on why federal agents who rarely fire weapons need several times more bullets annually than an Army officer. Who or what are they shooting at?

Republican Rep. Jason Chaffetz on Thursday asked Nick Nayak, DHS' chief procurement officer, a question we and others have been asking: Why has the Department of Homeland Security been buying so much ammunition?

Dismissed as a concern only of right-wing conspiracy theorists, the reported amounts as high as 2 billion rounds have varied and been explained not as a one-time purchase but a bulk buy over five years to reduce costs. It's one of the rare instances, apparently, a government agency has actually cared about such a thing.

Nayak appeared before Chaffetz's House oversight subcommittee to do what Obama administration officials are loath to do the actual math. Chaffetz has, and his number-crunching raises more questions than DHS has answered to date.

Chaffetz noted that the department currently has more than 260 million rounds in stock. He said the department bought more than 103 million rounds in 2012 and used 116 million that same year among roughly 70,000 agents.

Comparing that with the small-arms purchases by the U.S. Army, he said the DHS is churning through between 1,300 and 1,600 rounds per officer per year, while the Army goes through roughly 350 per officer.

Nayak, acknowledging that the five-tear potential bullet buy could be as high as 750 million rounds, did not contest Chaffetz's math and said the massive buys were needed for training. DHS has procured "approximately 120 million rounds of ammunition per year of all calibers and types and fired approximately the same number of rounds per year, almost exclusively for training purposes," according to Nayak's testimony.

"What does not make sense in the information you provided is that Customs and Border Control used (around 14 million) rounds for operational purposes when they rarely fire their guns," a skeptical Chaffetz said, citing just one example of a particular allocation.

Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), which falls under DHS's jurisdiction, fired "less than 100 rounds" during 15 shooting incidents last year, according to Humberto Medina, assistant director of ICE's' National Firearm and Tactical Training Unit. By this criterion, the DHS stockpile should last a very long time.

Jonathan L. Lasher, the Social Security Administration's assistant inspector general for external relations, has previously explained the purchase of 174,000 hollow-point bullets by saying they were for the Social Security inspector general's office.

Its 295 agents investigate Social Security fraud and other crimes. When they say they are cracking down on waste, fraud and abuse, they apparently mean it.

Another question is why so many hollow-point bullets are being purchased?

As former Marine Richard Mason recently told reporters with WHPTV News in Pennsylvania, hollow-points (which make up the bulk of the DHS purchases) are not used for training because they are more expensive than standard firing-range rounds. "We never trained with hollow points. We didn't even see hollow points my entire 4-1/2 (years) in the Marine Corps," Mason said.

We'd like to think this is just another example of government waste. Some have suggested these massive ammunition buys are an attempt to dry up supply as part of the administration's push for gun control.

We have asked if this has anything to do with then-candidate Obama's proposal for a national security force as powerful as the U.S. Army.

In a July 2, 2008 speech in Colorado Springs, candidate Obama said: "We cannot continue to rely on our military in order to achieve the national security objectives that we've set. We've got to have a civilian national security force that's just as powerful, just as strong, just as well-funded."

The government that would limit law-abiding citizens to some seven bullets to defend their families and their homes still has some explaining to do.